The following post....America....Free....Free Falllin'....was first posted in January of 2012. Sometimes I read these words anew....and considering how this country today is so much worse than it was when I ended that post with...."While angels sent by God prepare to blow their trumpets"....I wonder how it could even be possible that Christians at least....are not meeting every night....imploring of God for the return of the Lord Jesus....but I realize that God has left us to our own devices....whitewashed tombs with lifeless sermons....and broken cisterns that replaced the Fountain of Living Water. I have often in these posts in the last few years pointed back to February 4, 2020.....my seventieth birthday....when Trump stood before a Joint Session of Congress to give the State of the Union address. That was the year when Rush Limbaugh was honored....and Nancy Pelosi tore up Trump's transcript. America was riding high as Trump spoke these words...
"Tonight I stand before you to share the incredible results....(of the past three years)....Jobs are booming....Incomes are soaring....Poverty is plummeting....Crime is falling....Confidence is surging....and our country is thriving....America's fortunes are on the rise.....America's future is blazing bright....our pride is restored....("Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall" Proverbs)....we are moving forward at a pace that was unimaginable just a short time ago....and we are never going back....we are advancing with unbridled optimism"....and the address ended with this...."This nation is our canvas, and this country is our masterpiece. We look at tomorrow and see unlimited frontiers just waiting to be explored. Our brightest discoveries are not yet known. Our most thrilling stories are not yet told. Our grandest journeys are not yet made. The American Age, the American epic, The American adventure has only just begun. Our spirit is still young. The sun is still rising, God's grace is still shining, and my fellow Americans, the best is yet to come."
It was as Nebuchadnezzar's boast from the top of his palace. God was right at that moment bringing judgment through the pandemic. I'm reminded of 1 Thessalonians 5:3..."For when they say, 'Peace and safety!' then sudden destruction comes upon them, as labor pains upon a pregnant woman. And they will not escape." A little less than a year later Donald Trump was as if...eating grass on the White House Lawn. It is ironic that in the 1951 film....The Day The Earth Stood Still....the spaceship landed right on that same ellipse.
America....Free....Free Fallin'
Dawn breaks and pull by pull the flag rises until its stars and stripes blend into the red sky. The 21st century America cold front collides with the warm heritage of American liberty. Dark clouds form above the eagle perched atop the pole and the flag snaps as the winds begin another day of adding to the tatters and waiting for the rain that month by month fades the blue and red hues that Americans have savored as the taste of freedom for so long.
An icy chill settles in the bones of the one raising the flag for he knows that its stars and stripes will be indiscernible before long. He looks down to see if the cracks in the foundation supporting the pole have widened from the tremors that increasingly shake America...they have. He steps back, standing as erect as he can under the burden of seeing his nation collapse, and salutes; a tear forming as he knows that he may be the last to perform this duty. His mind wanders from, first... the drum and piper escorting the newly created flag, to the inspiration for Francis Scott Key's poem, to the charging Union soldier picking up the banner dropped by a fallen comrade in arms, to the lifting of the flagpole on Mt. Suribachi, to the camo flag on the fatigues of the grunt in Vietnam, to the brilliant contrast of red, white and blue with the gray mountain of fallen steel, brick and mortar of the World Trade Center, to the first responders rushing up those flights of stairs. to the lone flag now raised in the Green Zone of Baghdad.
In only a few hours cheers and shouts will be heard off in the distance, not for returning heroes, not as a President passes by, not as a war ends in victory but for the beginning of a football game. The Star Spangled Banner will play and be sung by the latest celebrity seeking a national spotlight but not a word of its lyrics will resonate with the power it had since Fort McHenry. We are not as the Roman Empire falling, we are as the Roman Empire beginning whose gods are numerous, whose Caesars consolidate powers given by a populace that only wants another day at the Coliseum. God's hand is being lifted and the exhilaration of choosing our own destiny emboldens us to stare into the eyes of Caesar and say not, "Give me liberty or give me death" but "Give me liberty to choose my own death." All the while the remaining Christians gather in their catacombs wondering if God's mercies on America are over; imploring of Him one more time for America to be a beacon to the nations, a people that not only openly proclaim Jesus Christ as the Savior of mankind but evidence the beneficence, mercy, majesty, power and glory of Him who created the universe and without whom not one molecule would continue to exist.
It was a marvel and a wonder while it existed in its original form....these United States of America, but now they are afflicted for lack of a shepherd. They are a people once different as night and day in their habits and their speech that bonded together as a new entity...Americans, freed from the tyranny of kings, freed from serfdom and most importantly freed from the lie that man is the master of his fate, the captain of his soul, but that freedom, once defended, is now merely petted in the lap of luxury, "Free" as the famous rocker penned..."Free Fallin'." The American Creed, never spoken but always evident, is now but a liberal screed against God, against tradition, and against history itself.
The sun, obscured throughout the day by clouds, sets in the West. The rain that would normally give life to the fields, runs off of the frozen, barren and lifeless ground. The flag is lowered and gently folded into the shape of a tri-cornered hat, one of the last vestiges that remain of the fight for independence. No Taps is heard, only the music of the night coming from wherever the revelers gather after the game. The winds die down, no longer needed, for the flag has been taken down, while angels sent by God prepare to blow their trumpets.
Addendum: At the peril of making this post too long to read....I thought this important enough. John Piper's ministry....desiringgod.org....highlights every day articles either by Piper who others who are part of the ministry. That article is usually given also in audio form....as was today's....Goats In Sheep's Clothing....Why We Warn The Lukewarm. I could have written this....if I was smarter. Greg Morse is the young minister who wrote it. It's only thirteen minutes long....but it has a very important message that comes through very clear....and it may be for you.....but it's also for any pastors....for this is a main illness in our pulpits today....the pastors do not warn....of anything! So if you live a life of a Christian lukewarmness....that does not save....and want to stay right there....then go to church....and you may not be saved....but you will be safe in where you are!
